When it comes to questions of whether to ordain gay and lesbian rabbis and perform same-sex commitment ceremonies, Reform and Orthodox Jews know where their movements stand. Simply put, Reform Jews do both, Orthodox Jews do neither.

“I have become profoundly disenchanted with our General Assembly process . . . the unsatisfactory way we were dealing with difficult and complex theological issues . . . and the toxic by-products of perpetually creating winners and losers, friends who are with us and enemies who oppose us.”

A seminary is conducting an online self-defense course for United Church of Christ members besieged by conservative reactions to their denomination’s liberal social positions on gay rights and other issues.

The bishops of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, meeting in early March, acknowledged that they were too divided to offer “a definitive word of advice” on a recommendation that regional synods restrain from disciplining churches that ordain gay clergy.

If this summer’s Evangelical Lutheran Church in America convention follows the advice of a sexuality task force to selectively permit ordination of homosexual pastors without fear of church discipline, the denomination will suffer “structural dissolution” and, at the local level, “intense division and disunity,” contends a group of influential Lutheran theologians and clergy.

Finding ways to live together amid disagreement has long been an Anglican ideal. That ideal is receiving its severest test as the Anglican Communion discusses the Windsor Report, issued in October in response to the election of an openly gay bishop in the U.S. and the blessing of same-sex relationships by some American and Canadian dioceses.